11 year shoots 8 year old dead!

We need guns to deal with today's modern super-animals, such as the flying squirrel and electric eel.

Only because you guys keep responding to gturner...

If it's about protection, why the clinging to guns? Get a tazer. Cuz, it's not about protection. It's about guns.

You do realize tazers kill people too, right?

totally not the point.

I don't trust tazers.

To be honest I have no idea where to even buy a tazer! They may not even be legal in Georgia, or require special licensing or training.

Sometimes a tazer simply pisses people off. Like Rodney King. Hit by two direct tazer hits, got to his feet and still charged the officers.

Past time to develop phasers, then.

If you take some Star Trek novels seriously, then use of a phaser on stun can kill someone as well.

Just as a Taser can kill someone with a heart condition. Still better odds than being shot with a high-speed projectile weapon.

The problem with "non lethal" weapon is that people consider "non lethal" to mean "safe" and thus have a lower threshhold to use them.

All the more reason to require training. And, of course, universal registration.

So now you want training and universal registration for "non lethal" weapons as well?

How about universal registration for cats and limiting their number per household?

You're the one who pointed out that they can kill.

Are you worried your cats will try to kill you? No wonder you need to carry.

I would do that for abortions.

You want to limit the number per household, or you want to perform abortions on cats?

Living children, however, are of no interest to you. They can starve or shoot each other and you're

Cats stitched to work gloves can be quite deadly.

What makes you think I and organizations I belong to do not do a great deal for children?

What do you do for the "living children" that you whine so much about?

What? Like ... you don't trust them to fire? Or ... you don't trust them to ... incapacitate your adversary? or ... something more ... sinister. You don't trust them like ..., they have a mind of their own and they could betray you at any minute?

I let one borrow my car once and I got it back with no gas.

What the hell do you think?

I'm sure I don't know. I've never used a tazer. Never used a gun for "protection" either. But, I do know, having had basic rifle marksmanship in the military, as well as having grown up target practicing with pistols, that if you looking for a gun for protection, most of the time, you lose. Guns are not an extension of your arm - regardless of how much you practice. I have known soldiers and sailors in all the different military "special forces" who adamantly stated that in a life and death situation, they were more likely to drop the weapon and use their hands.

So, no, I've no idea what you mean when you say you don't trust a tazer in response to having a gun for protection.

So you know people in all the different special forces that say they would drop their gun and start punching in a fight? I totally believe that.


Oh wait...no I don't.

I said I have known. I haven't been in the military in a very long time. But, yes, unless there is time to square up and aim and know where you are shooting, know you are not going to shooting blindly - possibly shooting innocent bystanders, then yes dropping a weapon and engaging in hand to hand combat when you are certain where your punches will hit - or a knife because a knife CAN be practiced and used as an extension of your arm, if preferable.

Or, you can just take it that those guys were trying to impress me with their physical prowess.

I can see transitioning from a firearm to something else depending on the circumstances. But you said "more likely" which I kind of doubt.

Your church? No doubt. But you won't even provide your own family with health insurance or beneficiary status on a life insurance policy. Why would anyone believe you'd help a stranger?

Most states do that anyway for safety and sanitation reasons.

No one wants to live next door to the cat hoarder with ten generation of cats under one roof.

ETA: Except for Soma, apparently, with that dumb rep.

She and most other people with any kind of compassion at all "whine" about living children because they're just that: living. Trying to survive a situation they had no choice in.

In an idea world, all children would be wanted when they're born and it wouldn't take the sum equivalent to the GDP of a developing country to allow for adoption. We don't live in that world. And even if we did, I'd still support a woman's judgement to decide if this is the best time for a pregnancy or not.